ONWARD

TLDR (too long, didn’t read) version:

LD1074 aimed at legalizing open air cremation in Maine did not pass the working session in May. Senator Vitelli and I are committed to trying again in 2022.

I will continue to write updates of our efforts in this blog.

For those up to reading a longer post:

I’d like to offer some history for any of you who don’t know the causes and conditions at play in the unfolding thus far.

First, my interest in figuring out how to legalize open air cremation in Maine began in 2015. I had already been working as a hospice chaplain for close to 5 years and had grown increasingly interested in alternative possibilities in death care. Patterns I noticed in my work inspired me to want to help people feel more empowered and connected in how they engaged death. At that time I became involved in the death doula and home funeral community and connected more directly with the folks in Crestone who since that time have been dialoguing with me about my efforts and offering guidance when needed.

Trusting the wisdom pace of things, I spent years feeling out how to nurture the right conditions for this to be possible. I connected with folks in Maine who offer home funeral and green disposition education. In 2018 I founded my non-profit to put my aim out there and eventually bought land in 2019 to further demonstrate my heartfelt intention in this effort. I had looked for land for years, searching for a parcel that was large enough and rural, but with access to a main road. I knew and continue to be aware that distance from residences and businesses is essential. And I have remained cognizant that my ideas of enough distance might not match what local folks feel is enough. So throughout all of this I have remained flexible in mind and heart and ready to let things change shape as they must.

After reaching out to a local legislator in 2019, and that falling flat, I reached out to Senator Vitelli in the summer of 2020 outlining my motivation, history and efforts in connection to my interest in legalizing open air cremation. Because of the craziness of our pandemic times, she couldn’t schedule a conversation until later in the fall of 2020. We spoke in November and had a wonderful conversation. She is particularly sympathetic to this aim as she has witnessed many open air cremations in India and her husband has witnessed them in Thailand. She understood, in a very direct way, the beauty and meaning in this form of disposition. She also expressed genuine respect for my years of working with dying and death and how that work informs these efforts.

She got a bill drafted that went before the Health and Human Services Committee in early April of 2021. They asked fantastic questions and all seemed genuinely open and curious about this form of disposition as well as what motivated our desire to allow this in Maine. Board member (who works for Maine Coast Heritage Trust) Amanda Devine and I fielded questions and had much anecdotal information from Crestone’s years of performing cremations as well as information from many of my friends who worked cremations at a private Buddhist pyre in Northern Colorado. I also spoke from my experience of witnessing cremations in India and Nepal. We spoke to the efficiency of the pyre design used in Crestone which we aim to replicate. It conducts heat in ways that shorten the length of the burn while maintaining a consistently high temp of 1500 degrees. This significantly lessens any issue with particulate matter.

The bill then had a working session with the same committee in early May of 2021. For all the openness and curiosity of the first session, the second was a significant contrast. In a working session, there is more concerted parsing of a bill in light of what exactly it would mean and involve, what existing laws it would impact and essentially, what it is aiming to do. Our bill’s language was quite general and in that, ended up asking for a number of exemptions from existing regulations. There were some legislators on the committee that did not even want discussion about the bill, stating very directly that they had “no interest” in this bill passing. Another legislator kindly insisted on discussion but eventually voted for the bill not to pass. The vote for it not to pass was unanimous. Ostensibly there was enough discomfort with the fact that the bill sought so many exemptions. Some clearly just don’t feel comfortable with the idea of this option. Some cited environmental concerns, even though Amanda Devine addressed environmental issues and questions. We are also talking about one pyre in a large state filled with people who use wood burning stoves throughout the winters.

Senator Vitelli called me after the working session. She is empathetic and genuine and expressed deep appreciation for all the work thus far. She also stated her interest in trying again. She said something along the lines of the bill receiving more support than any other she has sponsored. She knows part of that was due to the amount of press, which was a bit sensationalized, particularly in people’s gravitation to the more fantastical language of Viking funerals as people imagine them. As is detailed throughout our website, where we are coming from is informed by experience and a deep appreciation for the lived significance, sacredness and meaning if this disposition. She said that many people approached her and reached out thanking her for sponsoring the bill saying “This is what I want done with my body after death.”

So we are giving it another go in 2022 and taking everything we have learned from this process to inform a more nuanced presentation of our aim and a more precise wording of a bill. I know this idea just doesn’t sit well with some. And maybe it never will. I also know that for some people it will take an actual experience of an open air cremation for them to really understand how ordinary and beautiful this can be. It will take a direct experience to change their mind and heart. And this is a tricky edge we walk.

My aim is to continue to share updates and interesting things I come across on this blog. Though, that may be spotty. We closed the Good Ground Great Beyond Facebook page because it seemed to reach very few and I have been working to engage less with Facebook. So please touch in with this blog once in a while or just reach out through the contact page. For those who signed up for updates I will send emails as we take various steps to bring the bill back and when I write a new post.

Thank you for the support and please continue to talk with folks in your lives about this, about death and about life. We have the capacity to change our culture and we certainly have the power to wake up into our aliveness which is also embracing death as integral in the dance of that aliveness.